RE: Who owns signature guitar licks?

From: GROVES Peter <PeterGROVES[_at_]bdb-law.co.uk>
Date: Thu, 28 Aug 2003 14:09:32 -0400

Beckingham v Hodgens [2003] EWCA Civ 143 (you can find the judgment near http://www.courtservice.gov.uk/Judgments.do <http://www.courtservice.gov.uk/Judgments.do> ) held that the claimant, a session violinist, was a joint author of and owner of copyright in an arrangement of the song ("Young at heart") on which he played - the violin part being a major part of the finished production (not however owner of a separate copyright in the violin part). Generally, one co-owner of copyright cannot in English law exploit the copyright without the consent of the other, because the property of the other co-owner would be substantially diminished in value by such exploitation.  

Peter Groves
Bircham Dyson Bell, 50 Broadway, London SW1H 0BL Direct line 020 7170 0327

-----Original Message-----
From: Mike Phillips [mailto:copyrightlist[_at_]mikephillips.com] Sent: 28 August 2003 16:01
To: CNI-COPYRIGHT -- Copyright & Intellectual Property Subject: [CNI-(C)] Who owns signature guitar licks?

Hypo: Dobie Gray records "Drift Away", which was written by Mentor R. Williams. Assume for the sake of discussion (I have no idea what the truth is) that Gray never signed an assignment document for the master recording. The signature guitar lick in the recording was created (written) by Reggie Young. Assume that there was no writing between Gray and Young and that Young was not an employee for copyright purposes. Who, for copyright purposes, owns the copyright in the lick? Not the he would want to, but what would stop Young from playing the same riff on someone else's recording?  

My analysis, under this fact pattern, is that Reggie Young owns the copyright to his creation, and that Dobie Gray has an unlimited license to use the work, since Reggie was hired as a session musician.  

Mike Phillips    

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Received on Thu Aug 28 2003 - 22:09:32 GMT